Can I make skin look more tanned in-camera instead of editing later?
Asked 3/14/2017
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I want photos where skin appears more tanned or bronzed than it does in real life, preferably straight out of the camera rather than by editing afterward. Is there a camera setting for this on Canon, or on other brands?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
9y ago
2 Answers
27
You don't.
You might be tempted to change the overall color cast by lying to the camera about the ambient white balance, but that will be very tricky to get right and to reliably repeat.
The answer is to do this in post-processing. The job of the camera is to capture as much information about the scene as possible. If that is done well, then you have a lot of latitude about how to present some subset of that information in your final picture. That could include masking and performing operations on only parts of the image, for example. That is impossible to explain to a camera how to do, especially before the picture is taken.
Cameras are not for retouching or as a substitute for post-processing. Some consumer-oriented cameras do have limited processing capabilities. However, these are for appealing to the kind of people that buy a point and shoot in the first place. These features are for the unsophisticated consumer that actually believes "just press this magic button to make great pictures". These features are also a very poor subset of what is available in any decent post-processing app.
Originally by user7603. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user7603
9y ago
0
Generated from our catalog & community — verify before relying on it.
There usually isn’t a reliable single camera setting that makes skin look naturally “more tanned” in a controlled, repeatable way. The most accurate answer is: this is normally done in post-processing.
Why: a bronzed look often comes from a mix of tonal and color changes, sometimes only on the skin, which cameras can’t target well before the shot. Simply shifting white balance can affect the whole image and is hard to repeat consistently.
If you want a straight-out-of-camera result, some cameras offer JPEG processing presets. On Canon, Picture Styles can change contrast, color tone, saturation, and sharpness, and Canon’s Picture Style Editor lets you build custom looks. Similar profile/picture control options exist on other brands.
From the example discussed, the look may involve slight underexposure, lower saturation, and curve/color tweaks rather than just warmer white balance. Be careful: underexposing in-camera can lose shadow detail that you can’t recover later.
Best practice: shoot to preserve as much image information as possible, ideally RAW, then apply the bronzed/tanned look in editing. If you need it in-camera, experiment with custom picture styles/profiles, but expect less flexibility and consistency than post-processing.
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